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City Council accepts Bethel donation for police unit

Kris Vallotton, Bethel Church leader, addresses the Redding City Council on the night when city officials accepted a $500,000 donation from the church.(Photo: Nathan Solis/ Record Searchlight)Buy Photo

The Neighborhood Police Unit was saved Tuesday night thanks to a $500,000 donation from Bethel Church.

Councilwoman Julie Winter, a Bethel Church board member, recused herself and the remaining council members voted 4-0 to accept the donation.

The offer has drawn criticism from some members in the community who believe the church has overstepped its influence with city officials.

Kris Vallotton, a senior leader in the church, joked at Tuesday’s City Council meeting, “I have never had this much trouble in giving away money.”

The Neighborhood Police Unit, a four-officer unit that has shown great success over the past year, according to city officials, would have run out of funding on June 30 if not for the donation from Bethel Church, which offered to give the city $500,000 over two years to keep the officers active in Redding.

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The Redding City Council accepted a $500,000 donation from Bethel Church to fund a police unit over the next two years.

The offer was too good to pass up for city officials, who said they are facing a tight budget and could not find the money to keep the unit going past the summer.

A half-cent sales tax measure on the November ballot would have helped keep the neighborhood policing unit and nine apprentice firefighters on the city's payroll. But Redding voters overwhelmingly rejected Measure D.

Vallotton said church members heard about the potential loss of the policing unit and the impact to the community.

“I asked our team, can we build a multi-million-dollar building in the midst of a hurting city,” Vallotton said, referring to Bethel’s proposed campus slated for northeast Redding.

Bethel Church will now attempt to raise $740,000 through community donations by June. Any additional funding should go to keep as many firefighters on the payroll. Nine firefighter positions could be eliminated this June.

The church is also offering $50,000 for a marketing campaign to help raise the balance of the $1.24 million needed to keep the neighborhood policing unit operating over the next two years.

Chief Robert Paoletti said the policing unit has gone after street-level drug dealers, illegal massage parlors and performed investigations that normally could not be taken on by patrol officers.

“Being able to keep that unit going forward will have a great impact on the community,” he said. Paoletti declined to comment on the criticism surrounding the donated money.

Cory McCandliss, general manager of the Redding Civic Auditorium, will lead the fundraising campaign. The group will launch a website in the coming days so people can make tax-deductible donations to close the budget gap for the police unit. The campaign will also reach out to businesses and other churches in the community for additional support.

After the council’s decision, Vallotton said he was excited for the city to retain those officers and make Redding safer.

Councilwoman Francie Sullivan said criticism of the donation lacked evidence and anyone with other options to bring the city $250,000 were welcome. “Bring it,” she said.

The first $250,000 donation to the city will be made May 1 and the second will arrive sometime in 2018. Vallotton said the $500,000 has already been earmarked for the city.

City Manager Kurt Starman said when the city first started the neighborhood policing unit it did not plan for ongoing funding options. The upcoming budget will be “extremely tight,” according to Starman, citing pension cost increases across the state.

The city’s analysis of the donation is thin, Rob Belgeri said during the public comment period, and asked the council to reject the offer.

Outside the council chambers Amanda Smith, who lives and operates a business in downtown Redding, said she would like to see other solutions to fund the neighborhood policing unit. Bethel and other schools in the area could tap their students to help pay for expenses in the city, she said.

The failed sales tax to pay for the police unit was Plan A, McCandliss said, while the donation from Bethel, his church, is Plan C, a community plan.